Indroduction:
WE/WH currently are considered an underperforming class and are often overlooked for group/warband play. I believe they are viable in general, but could use a few tweaks make their abilities more consistent with that of other MDPS.

Armor and Survivability:
Create five tiers of armor: Cloth, Leather, Studded, Chain, Plate. WE/WH (and a few other classes) get bumped up to Leather which is between current Light and Medium Armo). This will increase survivability in melee slightly but not to equal the other two MDPS.

Builders/Finishers:
Reduce the AP costs of all builders by 5. They tend to be much more expensive than those found on other classes. Back in the day, the mechanic compensated for this, but most classes' mechanics have been buffed over time (Turrets, Auras, Stances, Pets) and a new, strong one added (Rage/Fury). Likewise, as more +STR/Melee power was included in the game, the high tooltip value of Finishers and procs cause the mechanic to pale, comparatively, to others.

Sever Limb/Confess!: have these build 1 accusation, for the sake of consistency.

Stealth Openers: have these deal slightly more damage. They used to scale insanely off of your stats, but have been nerfed about 40-80%. A minor increase in damage (15-25%) would be situationally helpful.

WH Specific:

Pistol: Add 30ft ranged autoattack with the pistol only

Seeker's Blade: changed to Seeker's Bullet, 30 foot range and procs Bullet. Currently, WE has a major advantage on Kiss Procs in terms of effect uptime and DPS. This would add one bullet proc to certain WH rotations as well as provide a ranged builder for minor combo chains. The WE would still have a big advantage in uptime/DPS, especially since they were handed several autoattack speed increasers (on sets, from BOs, tactics, improved SS).|

Dragon Gun: increase the contribution and tooltip values to be closer to what they were prior to the blanket AOE nerf (Mythic). Before, it was slightly more damaging than Absolution. Would make this finisher a powerful AOE burst, but by my understanding it would do about as much damage with a full charge as a Slayer/Choppa AOE Furious x13s. I also favor de-mirroring this ability from OYK, removing the KD but having the morale build/drain at 115/130/145/160/175. Radius would have to be tightened to compensate for increased damage.

Exoneration: Increase the duration to 15s. Morale is extremely weak and not justifiable for use vs. Confusing Movements or Sever Nerve. Two additional ticks (2000 healed/270 AP over 15 seconds) would make it useful in some situations.

Protection from Heresy: increase the value of the shield by 3x (to equal a cheap, low level absorb pot), and also make it affect allies within 30 feet, lasting 30 seconds. This is a really bad tactic, especially for x11, considering its max potential uptime without the relic is once per 32 seconds including the cast time on stealth. To compare, Tapping the Dark for example spams 300-350 absorbs all over the group, but is a fairly balanced low level tactic. This proposal is for a burst shield that's helpful to allies but on a long timer.

Blood, Faith and Fire: combine with Last Rites; groupmates all receive 75 AP and heal over time. From what I've seen of scen stats, I estimate WH will be getting around 2-5 kills per minute long engagement, which would put this tactic very roughly on par with a DoK/WP Motivation/Refreshment tactics. Less AP replenished considering optimal heal rotation for the WP/DoK, but a very small healing kick included.

Last Rites: changed tactic; whenever a groupmate dies within 100 feet of you, any morale they had before they died is split between surviving groupmates. Frankly, Order needs a few more morale builders and imo the original Bioware/Mythic ones are kind of exploitable and uninspired. This one would fit the class and namesake well.

WE Specific:

Dance of Doom: I think this is one of the worst M1s out there. I'd recommend extending its range to 10 feet and having it grant the WE +25% move, dodge, and parry while it channels as would fit a frenzied dance.

Frenzies: range bonuses on these should be removed. It was a bad move by Mythic to mirror ranges as that was part of the Bullets/Kisses trade-off.

On Your Knees!: morale drain/boost should be demirrored if we are going to do a morale overhaul. It was fine as a point-blank AOE KD with two hits and good damage.

Pierce Armor: it would be fine to have this reduce armor again rather than providing weaponskill, imo. A lot of this line was caught in blanket nerfs 10+ years ago when WE stealth openers were ticking for 600-800 every .5 seconds. An armor debuff feels more appropriate.

Sharpened Edge: not very useful atm. Proposal, every time you parry or your target blocks or parries your attacks, your armor penetration is increased by 3% for 5 seconds, stacking up to 5 times.

Enveloping Shadows: very bad tactic, as with WH equivalent. A strong point blank (30 foot) damage over time would be situationally useful for a Suffering build.

WE portion seems considerably shorter and nerf heavy. Nerfs are the last thing WEs need atm.

And problems we face are also related to the broader state of the game,w here all it takes to counter a ST dps, even in case of infinite ST damage, is a healer who is not asleep, even if they are not am/shaman, in which case your contribution amounts to absolutely nothing. That is why the "bugfix"(hard nerf) to broad severing/whatever WHs have is so devastating to us. Now we are in a state, where we don't have the damage to burn down people at a sufficient pace, are squishy as hell, don't bring utility(which you want to remove from WE) or have aoe of nearly any kind. We can't compete, in any realistic way now.

Seriously the biggest favor they could do us now is reverting the "bugfix" and pretend it never happened, with a fixed tooltip. Otherwise all WH/WE can say goodbye to ever getting Sov outside fo grinding defensive forts.

RIght now I don't know the precise damage/contribution numbers for Sacrificial Stab so I wasn't able to evaluate all of the WE lines. Basically the trade-off for WEs would be a stronger Carnage line, improved AP costs, and higher armor in exchange for losing the range that I think was a really bad idea to mirror.

I haven't read much feedback on Witchbrew either since the GCD was added/changed, but maybe it could be made to do some AOE damage if its generally underperforming.

As it is i believe we are simply the squishiest, with basically no real options to impact team play. Our "class nishe" is an obsolete playstyle, which no longer has a place, in the game of big aoe and instant resurrections. Stealth or no stealth(basically pointless since game is swarming with players, who stack lots of initiative regardless due to BWs).

Carnage currently is the tree used for both aoe and st outright damage specs.(Well before this patch... now what little aoe we had is basically gone outside OYK) because of the armor pen it offers. Then it generally depends on WE, but the knockdown/increased pain from rightmost tree and elixir of shadows/black lotus are common pick ups out of the middle. But as previously mentioned ST is worthless, in the current state of the game. Especially since you are recquired to be WB viable to get the endgame gear.

I was wondering what had happened to WH. I played one during live and remembered them being good but not OP. I just started ROR recently and my WH is laughable -- they are pretty useless now, which is sad

I was wondering what had happened to WH. I played one during live and remembered them being good but not OP. I just started ROR recently and my WH is laughable -- they are pretty useless now, which is sad

Many direct and indirect nerfs. Be it changes to abilites, gear stats, how stats are calculated, etc. This patch is just the latest example of kicking down an already struggling class

Group utility. Maybe make Blessed Bullets affect entire party or something. Also make morale gains/loses show up in combat log so people realize what is happening behind curtains.

AoE. Only Dragon Gun now that tactic has been "fixed".

No ranged mechanic builders. I like the OP's idea of increasing the range of Seeker's Blade and Silence the Heretic.

Low survability. You get into the melee blob in a city and you die to areas in 1/4 of a second. 1/2 a second if guarded. It'd be cool if you could just burn the backlines and avoid being there, but glass cannon is only true in the glass part, there are much better cannons out there.

Out of three stealth openers only Sudden Acusation is used.

Declare anathema. Why on earth would I want to leap away from my target as a mdps? Just to get away from the melee train or die to rangeds? I'd like to jump to the face of a kiting shaman, even while stealthed.

What about potions/doors while stealthed? I hate barely escaping and stealthing just to die from DoT damage.

Our "class nishe" is an obsolete playstyle, which no longer has a place, in the game of big aoe and instant resurrections
.......
But as previously mentioned ST is worthless, in the current state of the game.

I find the forums ironic with this. People always claim, "this isnt a 1v1 game so they won't balance around it."

Then people ask for buffs so we/wh can be useful in wb settings and get, "lol what do you expect, it's a solo 1v1 class, why would it do well in aoe?"

Our "class nishe" is an obsolete playstyle, which no longer has a place, in the game of big aoe and instant resurrections
.......
But as previously mentioned ST is worthless, in the current state of the game.

I find the forums ironic with this. People always claim, "this isnt a 1v1 game so they won't balance around it."

Then people ask for buffs so we/wh can be useful in wb settings and get, "lol what do you expect, it's a solo 1v1 class, why would it do well in aoe?"

One or the other. Class should be good at one of the two.

Heh right as many posts that I have read about balancing classes it amazes me at how many people have actually discouraged people from playing the WE/WH. If you have a game with all these unique classes and you get posts that says "Don't waste a year of your life playing this class" That is a HUGE red flag that says hey maybe we need to spend some more time looking at this. I am not saying that DEV's aren't looking at it or if they have time but with alot of changes being posted in and patched in These 2 classes need to be put at the top of the list.

So keep coming up with ideas and making suggestions post it in the proposal section maybe the squeeky wheel gets the oil. I'd like to see some of the top WH/WE players to get a compilation of the total fails and consensus of the bare minimum changes that need to happen as of yesterday. When people post though it gets so convoluted from people chiming in or throwing in trash it gets hard to follow.

Our "class nishe" is an obsolete playstyle, which no longer has a place, in the game of big aoe and instant resurrections
.......
But as previously mentioned ST is worthless, in the current state of the game.

I find the forums ironic with this. People always claim, "this isnt a 1v1 game so they won't balance around it."

Then people ask for buffs so we/wh can be useful in wb settings and get, "lol what do you expect, it's a solo 1v1 class, why would it do well in aoe?"

One or the other. Class should be good at one of the two.

Heh right as many posts that I have read about balancing classes it amazes me at how many people have actually discouraged people from playing the WE/WH. If you have a game with all these unique classes and you get posts that says "Don't waste a year of your life playing this class" That is a HUGE red flag that says hey maybe we need to spend some more time looking at this. I am not saying that DEV's aren't looking at it or if they have time but with alot of changes being posted in and patched in These 2 classes need to be put at the top of the list.

So keep coming up with ideas and making suggestions post it in the proposal section maybe the squeeky wheel gets the oil. I'd like to see some of the top WH/WE players to get a compilation of the total fails and consensus of the bare minimum changes that need to happen as of yesterday. When people post though it gets so convoluted from people chiming in or throwing in trash it gets hard to follow.

+1

Would love to hear what they actually want for we/wh. Do they want us to be good at ST solo roam? Warband? Good at one ok at the other? Etc.